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Indie Sales boards Quentin Dupieux’s Reality

SCREEN January 9, 2014 | By Melanie Goodfellow

Alain Chabat stars in the Los Angeles-set project.

Paris-based Indie Sales has taken on French director Quentin Dupieux’s upcoming Los Angeles-set pictureReality revolving around a director desperately searching for the perfect scream for his debut horror film.

The French and English language work stars French star Alain Chabat in the lead role alongside Jon Heder, Jonathan Lambert, Elodie Bouchez and Eric Wareheim in supporting roles.

Produced by Paris-based Realitism Films, it was shot in and around Los Angeles, in various locations including Hollywood, Malibu, Simi Valley, Santa Clarita, Santa Monica and Burbank in 2012 and 2013.

It revolves around three intertwining characters: an eight-year-old girl, called Réalité, who becomes obsessed with watching a mysterious VHS video tape she finds; Jason, a failed filmmaker in search of the perfect scream in a bid to get shady producer Bob on board his debut horror movie, and Denis, who makes his living as a TV host dressed in a rat costume.

Reality is DJ-turned-filmmaker Dupieux’s most ambitious film to date after a string of low budget indie hits including Rubber and Wrong which were also shot in the United States.

Naomi Denamur, who joined Indie Sales from Le Pacte in November, said of the acquisition: “We’re very happy to be working with such a talented director on his fifth feature. We’ll be happy to show a promo to buyers in Berlin.”

Diaphana is handling the French distribution. The film features music by Philip Glass from his 1971 album Music With Changing Parts.

Indie Sales was created by former TF1 sales and acquisition chief Eschbach launched Indie Sales in Cannes 2013 alongside producer Eric Névé with ambitions to distribute 12 titles a year. The outfit is entirely financed by Axone, a private fund specialising in French audiovisual investment.